Mucositis is a side effect of radiotherapy and chemotherapy mainly targeting cancer patients, and refers to a condition in which inflammation occurs in the intramucosal layer lining the mucous membrane or digestive tract.
Symptoms of mucositis include thinning of the intramucosal layer due to cell death, peeling thereof and occurrence of inflammation, resulting in ulceration. These lesions are extremely painful and may occur at sites within the digestive tract from the mouth to the anus, including the esophagus, stomach, small intestine, colon, and rectum. The occurrence of mucositis lowers the quality of life of patients. Severe pain in the oral cavity caused by mucositis leads to insufficient nutritional intake and impaired immune functionality. It can even lead to serious conditions that require stopping cancer treatment. However, currently available therapies lack approaches for effectively preventing or treating mucositis.
NecroX is a mitochondria-specific necroptosis inhibitor developed by LG Life Sciences, Ltd, and has received much attention as an innovative material simultaneously exhibiting an effect of inhibiting cell death due to toxins or stress, an effect of enhancing cell viability, and an antioxidant effect. It has been reported that, when human lung fibroblasts (LB-HEL cells) are treated with NecroX after being exposed to low-temperatures for 24 hours, NecroX has an effect of protecting against cell death caused by the low-temperature and an effect of preventing necrocytosis caused by tertbutylhydroperoxide (t-BHP) [Kim et al., Arch Pharm Res. 2010 November; 33(11) 1813-23; Choi et al., Transplant Proc. 2010 November; 42(9) 3414-21]. In particular, it has been reported that NecroX-7 has a protective effect against necrocytosis caused by oxidative stress and acetaminophen and an effect of preventing liver injury caused by carbon tetrachloride in a mouse model, and effectively inhibits liver injury due to ischemic reperfusion [Park et al., Antioxid Redox Signal. 2013 May 10; 18(14) 1713-22].
In addition, NecroX has been proven to also have a cancer metastasis inhibitory effect [Korean Patent Application Publication No. 2013-0088720].